The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny: a novel of ‘undeniable power’

Book cover of The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny — Kiran Desai’s third novel is one of the ‘strongest’ shortlisted contenders for this year’s Booker

(Image credit: Hamish Hamilton)

Kiran Desai’s third novel has been a long time in the making, said Lucy Scholes in The Daily Telegraph: its predecessor, “The Inheritance of Loss”, won the Booker Prize back in 2006. But despite this “lengthy gestation”, nothing about it “feels heavy or unwieldy”. A love story spanning nearly 700 pages, “The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny” is a “magnificent” achievement – and is one of the “strongest” shortlisted contenders for this year’s Booker.

Its two main characters come from wealthy neighbouring families in the Indian city of Allahabad, but both are in America when the novel begins. Sonia, who aspires to be a novelist, is at college in Vermont; Sunny is a trainee reporter in New York. When both return to India (Sonia to get over a relationship, Sunny to help a childhood friend), they meet by chance on a train – and feel an instant attraction. Over the pages that follow, Desai “skilfully traces their paths as they twist together and apart”, said Emily Rhodes in The Spectator. The result is “an enthralling love story” that blooms to cover many other themes: “alienation, creativity and the immense difficulty of finding a home”.

I wouldn’t exactly call it “gripping”, said Anthony Cummins in The Sunday Times. “The story unfolds without any obvious rhythm”, and its narrative momentum is “dissipated” by the frequent shifts in viewpoint. But strangely, this doesn’t really matter: it reflects the fact that this is a “grown-up novel that doesn’t hold the reader’s hand”. Sexy, dramatic and “packed with incident”, “The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny” is a work of “undeniable power and heft”.